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KiloClaw

Release Checklist Automation

Replace manual release rituals with a reliable pipeline

Turn error-prone manual release work (version bumps, changelog updates, tagging, publishing) into an automated, auditable workflow with human approval gates.

CommunitySubmitted by CommunityWork25 min

INGREDIENTS

🐙GitHub

PROMPT

Create a skill called "Release Checklist Automation". Ask me for: - Current release steps (bullet list) - Artifact targets (Docker, packages, app store) - Branching/versioning strategy Output: - A standardized release checklist - An automation workflow spec (with approval gate and dry-run) - Failure modes and rollback steps for the release pipeline itself

How It Works

Many projects accumulate "release rituals" that require dozens of manual steps. This recipe

captures the steps, verifies them, and automates them safely.

Triggers

  • Release process is "really manual" and easy to mess up
  • People forget version bumps or changelog updates
  • Releases happen from the wrong branch or with inconsistent tagging

Steps

  1. Document the current release steps as a checklist (single source of truth).
  2. Convert to automation:
  • derive version,
  • generate changelog,
  • tag,
  • build artifacts,
  • publish.
  1. Add an approval gate for publishing to production registries/stores.
  2. Add dry-run mode that validates release readiness without publishing.
  3. Store release artifacts and logs for auditability.

Expected Outcome

  • Releases become boring and repeatable.
  • Less human error and faster release cadence.

Example Inputs

  • "Our release process has 20 manual steps."
  • "We need consistent versioning and changelog generation."
  • "Automate GitHub releases and artifact publishing."

Tips

  • Automate the boring parts, keep a human gate for the irreversible parts.
Tags:#release-management#ci-cd#documentation#developer-productivity